I&#39;m a Very Important Man!

"I like your eyes," Naminé said conversationally, from where she sat sketching on the couch.

There was logic to this. If the world consisted of only pinholes, he wouldn't have them.

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"And I like yours," Valentine returned, his chest swelling a little in pride. Nevdr let it be said that Valentine didn't know how to take a compliment. "I'll tell you the honest truth, I'd never seen that colour until I saw your eyes."

The City of Light was just a tiny bit blue-deprived.

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"Thank you," she said, those eyes clearly amused. "Windows and pinholes would mean neither of us have pretty eyes. Is your director still being impossible?"

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"When is he not?" Valentine crossed his arms over his chest, clearly demonstrating his flair for the dramatic. "Either he's re-writing the script or firing the crew or making members of the cast cry. The only reason I continue showing up at rehearsals is my passion for the theatre, you know. Well, that, and the fact that we're beginning to wear him down, at last."

All it had taken was a well-placed cactus on the seat of his chair. Or two. And a small fire that one night. Not to mention speaking of That Scottish Play, whistling, wishing one another good luck in his presence, and some strategic placement of scrim and mirrors to make it appear as though they were constantly walking underneath ladders.

Nobody there was actually crazy enough to walk under a ladder.

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At first, Naminé had assumed that Valentine was being his usual, histrionic self, when detailing the crimes of this director. As time progressed, she found herself convinced that the director was to some degree incompetent, if not outright malicious.

It helped that many of his fellow actors had had similar complaints.

"Do you think you can force him to quit?" she asked. "Or will he only stay and become more and more disagreeable?"

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"Oh, nono. He won't be around much longer, I don't think," Valentine decided. Because it was totally Valentine's place to decide these things. "Tomorrow night, I'm going to set a fire neatly under his arse. That'll send him running and not looking back, for certain."

It was sad how sometimes it was impossible to tell if Valentine was speaking literally, wasn't it?

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It really, really was. She glanced at him.

"If the theater burns down, there won't be any play," she noted.

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"The lead has a fire extinguisher!"

Apparently, he was speaking literally.

"It's a prop."

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"Props won't help extinguish the fire, now will they?" she smiled.

Really, she'd expected as much from him.

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"We're about ten percent certain that there's actually some form of foam inside the canister," Valentine shared. Which, certainly, meant that the odds were in their favour, right?

There was another momentary pause, and then Valentine reached down and attempted to wrestle his shoe away from the dog.

"At this point, it's a risk we're willing to take, you know."

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The phone rang, as phones are occasionally wont to do.

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And that, which Sokka probably wouldn't hear unless his ears were far more acute than science could allow, was the sound of Valentine tripping over the dog (YIP!) in order to make his way across the room to answer it.

"You can't pay me enough to work on my day off," he announced as he picked up a phone.

Caller ID was a beautiful thing. It would be more beautiful if he ever bothered to use it.

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"I understand that," she said calmly, setting her sketchbook aside. "But burning the theater means none of you can participate in the play, as you'll be in prison. Or dead, in which case I shall be very upset with you. Couldn't you issue him an ultimatum? Either he steps down, or the cast itself will?"

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"Careful!" Naminé gasped, hopping up and tending to the puppy.

Yes, she was more concerned with their puppy than him.

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"He'd find a new cast," Valentine mused. "It would be a disaster. An entire stage filled with any young person who doesn't have a horrid aversion to crabs."

Okay, the crabs thing was a little unfair. No self-respecting crab would dare infest a specimen like that particular director, and Valentine would fully apologize to the little creatures should they ever call him on it.

Or, that is, he would have, if not for the fact that Valentines still didn't tend to apologize.

"There was a movie plot I saw once that involved concrete boots and the ocean. And we aren't too far from the pier..."

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Ohhh, that was too good a line to let hang, though. "I never paid you to work a day in your life!" the old-sounding voice grumped at him over the phone. "And I'm not about to start now! You'll work for free, or not at all!"

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For as expressive as Valentine's face was without benefit of a mask, it still took him a moment to figure out that the proper expression in this particular situation was a raised eyebrow.

"Well, then I vote 'not at all,' and I'll be more than happy to do it for free or for handouts," he decided, waving a sort of 'oops and I promise not to do it again' over toward Naminé and Bojangles. "I never was too proud to turn down a decent handout, you know."

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"I'm not going to ask how you know he has crabs," she said lightly. She stood up and brushed her hands off on her skirt. "Though if he's been requiring sex from his actors, I'll murder him myself."

He should realize that she was being literal, herself. He did, didn't he?

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"A handout of a no-fat soy whip latte?" Sokka asked. "Well, that's a given. I don't think I've seen you work without one."

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"Only the ones with cleavage," Valentine noted, "and not all of them. But that's a very effective way to gain a role as female lead, I've heard."

He pursed his lips and tapped thoughtfully at his chin.

"It's easy enough to tell who the actors are, and who the good best sex comes from. It's a matter of discerning between the main roles who can't act, and the extras who can."

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"I'll have you know that it's bloody impossible to work without a decent one of those, and I haven't had a good one since graduation last year." A pause, a grin. "Perhaps I ought to also inform you that we'll be in the market for a new costume mistress around these parts soon. The one in our local troupe apparently kisses better than she sews."

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"On those grounds, he's safe from me," she said easily, slipping an arm around his waist so she could lean up for a kiss. "I imagine we could find a more suitable solution to this difficulty than murder."

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Valentine would never, never shy away from a kiss. Perhaps a particularly nibbly one. He was fond of those.

"We could hire a man," Valentine mused, once the kiss was ended. "I hear there are people who do that sort of thing happily, for the right sum. Maybe they let people pay in cake?"

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Sokka grinned, too. Oh, if only the telephone could transmit that. "Well, unfortunately, so do I, so you're out of luck here. Buying coffee? THAT I can do. How have you BEEN? Both of you? If you don't come for graduation, I might never see you again, so I thought I'd say hi."

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"Graduation? You're graduating this semester?" That was an interesting notion. Things had changed for himself and Naminé, but for everyone else, it really felt as though things would stay the same for just about forever. "You know, I happened to miss my own graduation. I might have to see if I can find the means to get there for yours."

You could almost hear him waving a finger in the air thoughtfully, really.

"In the here and the now, we've been doing quite well. There's a dog. Did Naminé mention? He's taken to eating my footwear."

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"I doubt they would," she said. "I would be in favor of ruling out homicide entirely. Far too likely to go badly. If all else fails, I would be willing to join you in harassing him."

She could be particularly creative, on that front.

As for kisses, the previous one hadn't been nibbly at all. She should rectify that with a nibbly one, shouldn't she?

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"Perhaps," Valentine noted, somewhere between the first kiss and the next, "we could slip live goldfish into his shoes."

Not that the man ever had any reason to take off his shoes.

"Or down the back of his pants," Valentine amended.

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"I imagine civil disobedience might be useful," she mused. "Bring me in to re-work the props. Take a new direction with the roles. Begin addressing him as SIR EDWARDIGAN. Drive him mad."

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"Sir Edwardigan..." Valentine cocked his head sideways, chewing on that phrase. "Sir Edwardigan. You know, I actually like that?"

Oh, it would be used in excess.

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"Far less dangerous than arson," she laughed. "For all involved. Now you should tell me how very clever I am."

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